The second of two declarations being prepared by the Christus Medicus Foundation advocates enacting federal “Health Care Right of Conscience” legislation to protect health care insurers and health care providers.
Protection of Conscience Project News
Service, not Servitude
The second of two declarations being prepared by the Christus Medicus Foundation advocates enacting federal “Health Care Right of Conscience” legislation to protect health care insurers and health care providers.
Richard G. Roberts, MD, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, is reported to have said that physicians do not have a “statutory, constitutional or ethical” duty to perform procedures to which they object, but that the medical profession has an obligation to help patients access necessary legal services. The remarks appear to distinguish between personal and corporate obligations.
A law passed in 1999 included a requirement that would force Catholic hospitals to provide employee insurance coverage for artificial contraception. This has resulted in a lawsuit against the state. An application for a preliminary injunction is to be heard in a Sacramento Court in late August.
Japan, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the European Union are reported to be trying to make it illegal for health care workers to decline to perform abortions for reasons of conscience. The negotiations at the Beijing +5 conference are said to have broken down when Nicaragua proposed strong language to protect conscientious objectors. If accurate, these reports indicate that the US, Australia and New Zealand are attempting to impose on third world countries policies that are not acceptable in their own, since all three countries have enacted protection of conscience legislation for their own health care workers.
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Alberta Report, BC Report
The doctor walked into the lab and set a steel pan on the table. “Got you some good specimens,” he said. “Twins.” The technician looked down at a pair of perfectly formed 24-week-old fetuses moving and gasping for air. Except for a few nicks from the surgical tongs that had pulled them out, they seemed uninjured.
“There’s something wrong here,” the technician stammered. “They are moving. I don’t do this. That’s not in my contract.” She watched the doctor take a bottle of sterile water and fill the pan until the water ran up over the babies’ mouths and noses. Then she left the room. “I would not watch those fetuses moving,” she recalls. “That’s when I decided it was wrong.” . . . [Full text]